Rhode Island to remove guardrails blamed in deadly crashes

Rhode Island to remove guardrails blamed in deadly crashes

Jan. 24, 2018

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Rhode Island is joining several other states in removing a type of guardrail that has been blamed for deadly highway crashes.

State Department of Transportation spokesman Charles St. Martin tells The Providence Journal the department is removing all of about 350 Lindsay X-LITE guardrails from roadways "out of an abundance of caution."

Six other states are removing the guardrails after investigators found it failed to collapse properly when hit by a vehicle. A Tennessee man is campaigning to have them removed after his daughter was killed in a 2016 crash when part of the guardrail punctured her car.

St. Martin says the cost of removing them has not yet been calculated.

The company that makes the guardrails refutes investigators claims, saying they have passed federal crash and safety tests.